Composter
The composter's innovative planter lid integrates it into the living environment, improving user interaction, temperature regulation, and biodiversity while enhancing efficiency and aesthetics.
Patent Information
- Application Number
- DE202026000563
- Authority / Receiving Office
- DE · DE
- Patent Type
- Utility models
- Current Assignee / Owner
- Filing Date
- 2026-02-08
- Publication Date
- 2026-04-16
- Estimated Expiration
- 2036-02-29
AI Technical Summary
Conventional composters are often placed out of sight, making them distant from the user's living environment and lacking aesthetic appeal, which can affect user interaction and efficiency of the composting process.
A composter design featuring a lid that doubles as a planter or green roof, allowing plants to be grown, enhancing its integration into the living environment, improving insulation, regulating temperature, and promoting biodiversity while also serving as a repotting table.
The integrated planter lid improves user interaction, stabilizes composting temperatures, enhances biodiversity, and provides odor control, creating a more efficient and aesthetically pleasing composting experience.
Smart Images
Figure 00000000_0000_ABST
Abstract
Description
[0001] The present invention relates to a composter.
[0002] It is known that selective waste sorting and collection is important to achieve a circular economy and society.
[0003] One of the well-known selective waste streams is green waste or so-called biowaste.
[0004] Instead of having it collected separately by the local authority or another body, there are also so-called composters, which allow the composting of organic waste on site, for example at private homes.
[0005] Such composters consist of a container or barrel with a lid and are often made of plastic.
[0006] These types of composters have the advantage that the transport of organic waste to a processing plant is eliminated.
[0007] Furthermore, such composters provide fresh and nutritious compost that can be used in the garden, for houseplants, and the like.
[0008] One disadvantage of such composters is that they are usually placed out of sight and are therefore literally and figuratively further away from the user's living environment.
[0009] The present invention aims to provide an improved composter.
[0010] The present invention relates to a composter consisting of an open container formed by side walls and which can be closed by means of a lid, characterized in that the lid comprises a pot or box in which plants can be planted.
[0011] For example, herbs or sedum can be planted in the above-mentioned pot or box to create, for example, a kind of herb garden or sedum garden.
[0012] The cover then becomes a kind of green roof, instead of a standard plastic cover.
[0013] One advantage is that the composter, with its more attractive view of the lid and its association with an activity such as growing plants, herbs, and the like, is brought closer to the users' living environment.
[0014] Furthermore, a circular process is created whereby the green waste from plants, herbs and the like enters the composter through the lid, and the resulting compost can be added to the plants, herbs and the like.
[0015] Another advantage is that the lid, which essentially becomes the green roof of the composter, insulates it better, so that the temperature in the composter is more stable.
[0016] This prevents the composting process from coming to a standstill in winter due to the cold or from progressing too quickly in summer due to the heat.
[0017] Another advantage is that the green roof helps to absorb rainwater and, if necessary, gradually feed it into the composter, thus influencing the composting process.
[0018] Furthermore, the green roof promotes biodiversity through the plants, herbs, and the like it contains.
[0019] Furthermore, the green roof contributes to better odor control by filtering odors with the help of the plants in the green roof.
[0020] Preferably, the lid is composed of two to four separate removable parts, with at least one of the removable parts comprising a box or pot.
[0021] These parts can be placed side by side on the composter and together form the aforementioned lid.
[0022] Each of the two to four separate parts can be shaped like a box or a pot.
[0023] One advantage is that the weight of the individual parts is more limited than with a large lid, which makes removal easier.
[0024] According to a preferred feature of the invention, one of the removable parts has a flat surface that can serve as a potting table.
[0025] The lid then becomes, so to speak, a combination of a planter or flower box and a repotting table, which increases the functionality of the composter and allows more interaction between the user and the composter.
[0026] In an alternative embodiment, the lid is shaped like a box or pot that fits onto the open container.
[0027] In one practical embodiment, the side walls on the inside of the open container are provided near an upper edge of the side walls with one or more thickenings or bulges that serve as a support for the lid.
[0028] One advantage is that the lid is supported more strongly by the thickenings or bulges and not solely by the top edge.
[0029] Furthermore, it is possible to design the lid to be at least partially recessed.
[0030] For the purpose of better illustrating the features of the invention, some preferred embodiments of a composter according to the invention are described below by way of example, but not exhaustively, with reference to the accompanying drawings, wherein: Fig. 1 schematically and perspectivally represents a composter according to the invention, Fig. 2. Empty the composter Fig. 1 without lid Fig. 3 a variant to Fig. 2 represents.
[0031] In Fig. Figure 1 shows a schematic and perspective representation of a composter 1 according to the invention.
[0032] The composter consists of an open container 2, which is formed by ventilated side walls 3.
[0033] “Ventilated side walls 3” here means that the side walls 3 allow ventilation of the composter 1 and therefore do not seal it hermetically.
[0034] In this case, the open container 2 is a square or rectangular container 2, but it can also be a round container.
[0035] The open container 2 consists of plastic boards 4, but could also be made of wood.
[0036] The boards 4 are removable to allow access to the compost in composter 1.
[0037] It is possible that the open container 2 has a bottom, or that the container 2 does not have a bottom, but is also open at the bottom.
[0038] The composter 1 can be closed by means of a lid 5 which, according to the invention, comprises a pot 6 or a box in which plants can be planted.
[0039] In the example of the Fig. 1 The lid 5 is composed of four separate removable parts 7, each part 7 being formed by a pot 6 or box which together form the lid 5.
[0040] It is also possible that the four boxes or pots form a whole.
[0041] Of course, the number of pots 6 or boxes, that is, the separate removable parts 7 of the lid, is not fixed for the invention; it can also be, for example, two or three or more than four pots 6.
[0042] To illustrate, 6 plants or boxes were placed in two of the four pots.
[0043] In this way, a green roof is created on composter 1, or, in other words, the lid 5 is a green roof.
[0044] Instead of the separate removable parts 7 being boxes or pots 6, one or more parts 7 can also comprise a flat surface that can serve as a repotting table.
[0045] In this way, a lid 5 is formed for the composter, which includes both a green roof and a repotting table.
[0046] Although in the example of the Fig. 1. Since there are four separate parts 7 which together form the lid 5, it is not excluded that the lid 5 is formed as a single pot 6 or box which fits onto the opening 9 of the open container 2 and in which the plants 8 can be planted.
[0047] In Fig. In 2, the composter 1 is shown without lid 5, so that the inside is visible.
[0048] As can be seen in this figure, the side walls 3 on the inside of the open container 2 near an upper edge 10 of the side walls 3 are provided with protrusions 11 in the form of a slat 11, which serve as a support for the lid 5.
[0049] When the pots 6 or boxes are placed on the open container 2, they effectively rest on the slats 11.
[0050] In this case, these protrusions 11 extend over the entire inside of the open container 2, but it is also possible that the protrusions 11 extend only over part of the side walls 3.
[0051] As in Fig. As can be seen in Figure 1, the pots 6 or boxes are therefore easily sunk into the open container 2.
[0052] To achieve this, the pots 6 or boxes are designed to be slightly smaller than the opening 9 of the open container 2.
[0053] Of course, it is possible that the pots 6 or boxes are larger than this opening 9, so that when the lid 5 is closed, they rest on the upper edge 10.
[0054] Fig. Figure 3 shows the composter 1 in which one of the individual removable parts 7 has been removed and in which a number of boards 4 have been removed for illustration purposes.
[0055] As can be seen in this figure, the pots 6 or boxes are provided with a stepped side wall 12 on two projecting edges, which fit onto an upper edge 10 of two projecting side walls 3.
[0056] As a result, the pots 6 or boxes partially fall below the upper edge 10 of these two protruding side walls 3.
[0057] The other two side walls 3 have an upper edge 10 that extends higher and is flush with the pots 6 or boxes, so that the pots 6 are, so to speak, sunk into the composter 1.
[0058] Two handles are also provided on the two aforementioned protruding edges with stepped side wall 12 in order to be able to adjust the pots 6 or boxes.
[0059] The present invention is by no means limited to the exemplary embodiments described and illustrated in the figures, but a composter according to the invention can be realized in all possible shapes and dimensions without exceeding the scope of the invention.